As many of us are waiting for our Intel Galileo board promised by Microsoft, and right after the Raspberry Pi foundation announced the Raspberry Pi Model B+, Intel has introduced a new version of the Galileo board which they simply call Galileo Gen 2. The development board is still powered by Intel Quark single core SoC (Pentium class) and with the same key features as the original Galileo Board, but with some tweaks based on the feedback from the community.
Intel Galileo Gen 2 specifications (Changes in Bold):
- SoC- Intel Quark SoC X1000 single core, single-thread application processor @ 400 MHz, with 12KB embedded SRAM
- System Memory – 256MB DDR3, 5
- Storage – 8MB NOR fklash, 8KB EEPROM, and micro SD card slot (up to 32GB)
- Connectivity – 10/100M Ethernet
- USB – 1x USB 2.0 host port, 1x micro USB 2.0 device port used for programming
- Debugging / Programming
- 10-pin JTAG
- 6-pin 3.3V USB TTL UART header (replaces 3.5mm jack RS-232 console) for better compatibility with existing debug boards.
- 6-pin ICSP
- Expansion
- full-sized mini-PCI Express slot
- Arduino Uno R3 headers that support most Arduino shields:
- 20x digital I/O (12x fully native speed)
- 6x analog inputs
- 6x PWMs with 12-bit resolution
- 1x SPI master
- 2x UARTs (1 shared with console UART)
- 1x I2C master
- Power
- 7 to 15V via power barrel (instead of just 5V)
- Optional 12V PoE support
- Dimensions – 123.8 mm (L) × 72.0 mm (W)
Another improvement is that console UART1 can be redirected to Arduino headers in sketches, which can eliminate the need for soft-serial. The board is still programmable with the Arduino IDE in Windows, Mac OS or Linux operating systems, and supports Yocto 1.4 Poky Linux release. The company also claims the board is open source hardware with schematics, Cadence Allegro board files, and bill of materials (BOM) available for download (soon).
The board will be available in August, for $60 according to MakerFlux. You can find more information, and download some documentation such as schematics (PDF), a getting started guide, and product brief on Intel Galileo Gen 2 page.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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Somehow people compares this to the Raspberry Pi (for example look at the MakerFlux link) which is quite wrong due to the fact the Quark is single threaded.
From what I read when running a Linux distro on the Galileo one will encounter segfaults with some applications due to bugs that only pop up when the processor is single threaded.
Shame, this would be a perfect board to connect my printer to the cloud as only proprietary x86 binary drivers exist for it.
For running Linux I think I’ll be waiting for the single core MinnowBoard MAX.
Nettops may be cheaper 😉
If you really want something powerful switch to a real MCU like NXP LPC43xx or STM32F4 @168Mhz as it beat easily (in power consumption, fast GPIO/peripherals, speed, price and simplicity LQFP package Flash Memory …) Intel Galileo which is just an old recycled PC Pentium CPU, even if it runs @400MHz, Pentium instruction set is slow and memory is slower than any MCU with 0 waitstate SRAM/FLASH, and Galileo have only 12KB embedded SRAM it is ridiculous.
Maybe next time Intel will do a REAL MCU not a recycled PC CPU.